The present invention relates to foot-operated exercising devices, and particularly to the type including a pair of foot pedals rotatably mounted to a frame to be foot-driven by the user for exercise purposes.
Foot-operated exercising devices have become quite popular as a means of providing healthy exercise. The conventional foot-operated devices are usually of the bicycle type, including a seat to be occupied by the user, and a pair of handle bars to be hand-gripped as the user rotates the foot pedals with his or her feet. Such bicycle type exercising devices, however, are bulky in construction and heavy in weight, and are therefore not conveniently portable from one place to another. Moreover, they are costly to construct and therefore carry a high price which limits their use.
Various proposals have been made for building simpler, less expensive foot-operated exercising devices, examples of such latter devices being illustrated in U.S. Pat. Nos. 2,668,709; 2,673,088; 3,259,385; 3,704,886; 3,751,033; 3,968,963; 4,222,376 and 4,225,130, and French Pat. No. 1,526,276. Generally, however, the latter devices can be used only with specially-constructed or specially-dimensioned chairs, or are large and bulky and not collapsible for convenient portability or storage. Primarily for these reasons, such latter devices have not gained the popularity of the conventional bicycle-type foot-operated device.